Tag Archive: Star Trek 50th anniversary

When I was a kid Star Wars blew me away and when I think back it was the “wretched hive of scum and villainy”–specifically the creature cantina at Mos Eisley spaceport–that first introduced me to the idea of a wide, wide universe of alien beings. Countless characters–makeups and costumes designed by movie artists in the real world–all milled about in one place and it was about as cool a thing as anyone could put on film. My next great appreciation for aliens came from the Star Trek films, in particular the delegation of members of the United Federation of Planets in Star Trek IV: A Voyage Home–this bizarre assemblage of leaders, all wearing the common United Federation of Planets maroon officer uniforms, but each representing some far off world with all sorts of strange and exotic denizens. Much of my excitement for aliens would come from Michael Westmore’s wonderful “aliens of the week” in the various television incarnations of Star Trek–I am a fan and self-proclaimed expert in the aliens of Star Trek more than any other corner of that great franchise. Later I would be dazzled by the unique alien designs of Doctor Who’s 21st century Renaissance, where the British series really upped the ante of how unique and complex a weekly show could illustrate the potential of who is “out there.” The updated Mos Eisley for science fiction fans would reach its zenith for me in two great ways in 2016 and 2017: In the diverse cultures of the Yorktown space station in Star Trek Beyond and in the immensely populated Big Market in Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets. As much as the original Mos Eisley still stands strong on film, these two modern updates of “strange new worlds… new life and new civilizations” represent the best modern creativity in the world of cinema. Makeup artist Joel Harlow, who won an Academy Award for his makeup work for Star Trek (2009), returned to the franchise for Star Trek Beyond, and in honor of the Trek’s 50th anniversary his team created 50 new alien races for the film. A new book just released, Joe Nazzaro’s Star Trek Beyond: The Makeup Artistry of Joel Harlow documents in photographs and descriptions the development and creative ideas behind each new race for the film. As a fan of aliens and Star Trek and this fabulous film, I haven’t anticipated a new publication as much, and I couldn’t be more satisfied with the result.

Journalist Joe Nazzaro assembled Star Trek Beyond: The Makeup Artistry of Joel Harlow unlike most behind the scenes accounts that only punctuate descriptions with the odd quote from a creator, instead providing his narrative as a reporter would–interviewing and sharing Harlow and his creators’ complete, firsthand accounts of developing, designing, casting and even applying many of the makeups. We hear about Star Trek (2009) and Star Trek Beyond from Harlow and creators behind the scenes including concept artists Neville Page, Allen Williams, and Carlos Huante, sculptor/makeup artist Richie Alonzo, and designer/sculptors Don Lanning, Joey Orosco, Lennie MacDonald, Norman Cabrera, and Mike Rotella. This is the kind of access to the minds of movie creators that fanboys and fangirls dream about.

Let’s start with Jaylah. By my count, in the vast world of great Star Trek female characters Jaylah (portrayed by Sofia Boutella) is the most developed, most intriguing, best badass heroine of them all. Harlow, Neville Page, and Richie Alonzo really flesh out for readers the idea to application method of the unique makeup for this lead character from the film. Although it may not be the most complex makeup design at first look, it required elaborate and surgical artistry to replicate it each day, and balanced many requirements to allow the actor to move freely through action sequences and stand out as the driving force behind the plot of the film. Equally important to the film was the villain Krall (portrayed by Idris Elba) a character made up of all the alien races he had absorbed (which included callbacks to Star Trek’s Jem’Hadar) requiring additional complexity in design and style via its character’s backstory. Creators Harlow and Joey Orosco delve into the creation of the four phases of Krall’s design made for the movie.

The most brilliant makeup is no doubt the alien Natalia (who appears on the book cover), the fabulous, spectacular nautilus-headed design by Allen Williams and Don Lanning and sculpted by Joey Orosco with contributions from Werner Pretorius, Lennie MacDonald, Steve Buscaino, Cristina Patterson, and Toby Lindala. The head, bust, and arms for Natalia must reflect one of the best creature designs to ever emerge from Hollywood, and yet, like many of the 50 new aliens designed for the film (technically 56 according to Harlow) the character did not get much screentime. In fact many of the aliens were for background shots and astonishingly a few did not make it into the final cut of the film. The artists in the book also confirm the H.R. Giger influence on some of their designs for Star Trek Beyond–his designs also influenced alien creations of earlier Trek incarnations. One of my favorite footnotes to the Star Trek franchise, and certainly one of the most obscure references in classic Star Trek is an intercom on the Enterprise-D in Star Trek: The Next Generation paging Dr. Selar to the Null-G ward–which we never actually get to see–but the Abe Sapien-meets They Live alien called Satine (designed by Allen Williams and sculpted by Matt Rose) is exactly the type of alien I envisioned you’d find there.

Luckily for fans of Star Trek, the 50th anniversary of the franchise coincided with last year’s release of Star Trek Beyond, one of the most exciting films in the movie series. That was thanks in part to makeup artist Joel Harlow taking the new alien creatures where no one had gone before. Nominated for an Academy Award for his work on Star Trek Beyond, Harlow took on the daunting challenge of creating more than 50 new alien races for the film–one in honor of each year since the first episode aired on television back in 1966. Those designs will be featured in a giant chronicle published this week by Titan Books. Star Trek Beyond: The Makeup Artistry of Joel Harlow by Joe Nazzaro is surprisingly the first book to focus exclusively on the makeup artistry for Star Trek.

The closest prior work on creating makeup for aliens from beyond the Final Frontier, Star Trek: Aliens & Artifacts by Michael Westmore and Alan Sims (still available at Amazon here) was a shorter, trade paperback overview of Star Trek makeup and props, and Westmore’s recent book, Makeup Man by Michael Westmore (reviewed here at borg.com) focuses more on the pre-Star Trek work of Westmore. Star Trek Beyond: The Makeup Artistry of Joel Harlow author Joe Nazzaro also co-wrote a magazine-length overview of Westmore’s makeup work for Starlog, still available from time to time here.

Together with a staff of artists, Harlow embarked on the unprecedented scope of the project, while documenting the entire creative process for each of the 50 new alien types in exhaustive detail, from preliminary sketches to final make-up application. Below is a preview of Star Trek Beyond: The Makeup Artistry of Joel Harlow courtesy of the publisher. The new hardcover book is available for pre-order here at Amazon for only two more days at more than $15 off the cover price (price listed as of October 1).

Our borg.comBest of 2016 list continues today with the Best in Print and a bonus wrap-up of other year’s bests. If you missed it, check out our review of the Top Picks and Best Movies of 2016 here, the Kick-Ass Heroines of 2016here, and the Best in Televisionhere.

Without further ado, this year’s Best in Print:

Best Comic Book Series – Old Man Logan (Marvel). With just enough backstory from prior series focused on the future world version of Logan/Wolverine, writer Jeff Lemire and artist Andrea Sorrentino took us through the struggle of the superhero that survived all his contemporaries, only to be plunged into a parallel world where everything is familiar but nothing is the same.

Best Graphic Novel – Wonder Woman: The True Amazon, Jill Thompson (DC Comics). Writer/artist Jill Thompson is probably the best creator in comics today. Her origin story of Wonder Woman is vibrant, and she presents a flawed, complex, and ultimately strong and fearless heroine. The best Wonder Woman book we’ve ever read.

Best Comic Book Limited Series/Best Crossover Comic Book Series – Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (DC Comics/IDW). James Tynion IV and Freddie Williams II pulled together an impossible team-up of characters that ended up working great together. An action-packed, nostalgic fun trip.

Best Comic Book Writing – Matt Kindt, Dept.H (Dark Horse). Kindt pulls together an incredibly nostalgic assemblage of the best action concepts: classic science fiction of the H.G. Wells variety, G.I. Joe Adventure Team-inspired characters, and a fun character study and whodunit that will have you searching out your old game of Sub Search. We just hope he makes a prequel at some point so we get to see a similar quest with an old fashioned copper-helmeted deep sea diver. A fun read month after month and the best writing comics have to offer.

After the cut we continue with the best in comics, books, and more from 2016:

It will take fans of the earlier editions of The Star Trek Encyclopedia: A Reference Guide to the Future, Revised and Expanded Edition less than a dozen pages of browsing to realize the enormity of the material–and the effort–required to update the previous 1999 edition for this 50th anniversary boxed, hardcover, two-volume reference published this week. Enterprise–the series that has been virtually ignored in Star Trek reference publications, finally gets its due, as does the later seasons of Voyager, the last season of Deep Space Nine, and the films Star Trek Nemesis,Star Trek (2009), and Star Trek Into Darkness.

An invaluable reference until the creation of the online fan-run Memory Alpha, the original three editions of the The Star Trek Encyclopedia were the only place for fans to get quick Star Trek data with the last update in 1999. The advent of the Internet seemed to have spelled certain doom for any hope of a revised and updated edition. Memory Alpha has more than 40,000 pages of detailed Star Trek reference data. How could a 1,056 page two-volume edition compete? For one, long-time fans of all or many of the Star Trek series likely appreciate the ability to pull a reference book off the shelf. Memory Alpha’s recent updates make the website difficult to navigate and website TrekCore’s value is very much in its screen captures. Star Trek reference works have been very sporadically released in the past 20 years, so fans are always clamoring for a new book. The Star Trek Encyclopedia is very much an encyclopedia, and many may not remember the days of pulling a volume of an encyclopedia off the shelf and reading it through for entertainment. This is a great set of books to do just that. And the detailed content is what fans want.

Excluding this summer’s release Star Trek Beyond, original edition creators (and former Star Trek art department creative gurus) Michael Okuda and Denise Okuda craftily and seamlessly weaved the J.J. Abrams’s movies–called the Kelvin timeline now– into this work as explained in their foreword (only Star Trek (2009)’s villain Nero’s entry, for example, bridges both the Prime timeline and the Kelvin timeline in The Star Trek Encyclopedia). The Star Trek Encyclopedia is also the first publication that thoroughly addresses the nuts and bolts of Star Trek Into Darkness.

I came up with a list of my favorite items: references, characters, objects, and places that did not turn up in the past editions, to see if they all were now included. They were, except for entries and images of certain key alien weapons, uniforms, and artifacts from the Kelvin timeline (like John Eaves’ beautifully designed Klingon weapons, Romulan disruptors and rifles, or the new Klingon uniforms and helmets). These types of updates are present across the board for Enterprise, Deep Space Nine, and Voyager. Artist Ian Fullwood updates Doug Drexler’s artwork quite well, adding to his work updates with the same look and feel as Drexler’s original creations. Don’t expect past entries to be updated other than some have updated photographs–the research and preparation was clearly all about the new series and movies, also what the fans want and expect.

Twenty-five years ago one of the finest episodes of television aired on your local channel carrying syndicated programming. Arguably the best episode in the history of the Star Trek franchise, frequently found atop “best of Star Trek” lists, and among the best of all science fiction stories, it was Darmok, the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode featuring guest star Paul Winfield as the noble Tamarian Captain Dathon. Darmok first aired September 30, 1991, the first standalone episode of the excellent fifth season, which featured memorable episodes including Ensign Ro, Unification, Cause and Effect, The Perfect Mate, I, Borg, The Next Phase, and another highly rated standalone episode that bookended the season, The Inner Light. Written by Joe Menosky and Philip LaZebnik, and directed by Winrich Kolbe, Darmok broke new ground for Star Trek first and foremost by removing the universal translator from the equation and allowing one of the 20th (and 21st) century’s key challenges–communication between cultures–to be the focus of an episode. Like the transporter beam and the holodeck, the translator was a story device–a crutch of sorts–that allowed writers to skip beyond basic problems and move along to more complex conflicts. Darmok took Star Trek back to the basics.

The Federation and the Tamarians–also called the “Children of Tama”–historically failed to break the language barrier, and therefore never could open up diplomatic relations, until 2368. The Tamarians were an intelligent and strong alien race–their ship easily overpowered the Enterprise-D. Piglike in appearance thanks to the make-up work of Michael Westmore, they wore warrior clothing (designed by Robert Blackman) that was reptilian in design, with a vest of multi-colored grommets, and a bandolier of leather, copper, and brass that supported a sheath with a dagger that was both practical and ceremonial. The vest featured totems, crystals wrapped in shaved metal, used for personal spiritual ceremonies. The captain kept a log book at his belt, chronicling his journey in the strange written language of the Tamarian people.

Shaka. When the walls fell.

The Tamarians reached out to the Federation first, resulting in Captain Jean-Luc Picard (Patrick Stewart) confronting Dathon via bridge-to-bridge visual communication in orbit of the planet El-Adrel IV. Frustrated by the continued dissonance, Dathon beamed himself, and Picard, to the surface of the planet. Dathon’s goal: To use the metaphor of “Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra”–a Tamarian story where two warriors joined together by facing a common foe–to bring himself and Picard–and thereby both cultures–together, one way or another. What took Picard and the viewing audience the course of the episode to learn, that one could begin to understand the Tamarians once you realized they communicated in metaphors, came too late for Dathon. The enemy of the metaphor–the planet’s beast in the reality they faced on the surface of El-Adrel IV–attacked both him and Picard, but not before Picard understood.

You can usually expect that the Smithsonian Institution productions will deliver quality programming, and its latest is no exception. The two-hour documentary Building Star Trek chronicles fifty years of Star Trek from its inception to the artifacts of the series that remain decades later, and from the idea of a 23rd century future and beyond to futuristic technologies being made reality today.

The Smithsonian used two museum exhibits to bookend its overview of Star Trek for the 50th anniversary, one on each coast. At the Smithsonian’s own National Air and Space Museum (NASM) in Washington, DC, the museum recounts the recent restoration of the original filming model of the Enterprise, which has been on display there since 1974, but not as a featured display. On the West Coast the EMP Museum in Seattle created a display of props and costumes as well.

Interspersed with snippets from the progress of each museum’s projects are interviews with insiders like reboot actor and writer Simon Pegg, actor Karl Urban, original series star Nichelle Nichols, original series writer DC Fontana, and Trek fans. With each artifact featured in the exhibits, a short segment is given to an original creator, like the designer of the original shuttle Galileo, and a modern-day scientist working on the implementation of concepts introduced or emphasized in Star Trek, like phasers, tricorders, transporters, the universal translator, and warp drive.

The Star Trek display running currently at the EMP Museum in Seattle.

The documentary doesn’t take itself too seriously, using campy graphics that reflect the humor of the original series–an acknowledged critical component of the show’s success.

Creating a television series that makes it to a second season is a difficult thing to do. It’s difficult today and was just as tough in 1966 when Gene Roddenberry created a full-color science fiction show in prime time about a “Wagon Train to the stars”–a Western in space–a Star Trek. The unlikely series survived into not only its second season but also a third. An untapped audience–a group of loyal fans kept the dream alive, and the stories would continue in an animated series in the early 1970s. With the success of Star Wars, Star Trek made its way to the big screen by the end of the decade and the rest of the story, as they say, is history.

The future predicted in 1966 to “explore strange, new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations,” isn’t here yet, despite the dates of yesterday’s future arriving and going by. But that hasn’t stopped generations of fans from being inspired to pursue everything from medicine and law to astronomy and design. To make this world better and build a greater tomorrow. Star Trek may not have arrived yet, but the utopian future is something many of us look forward to and strive for.

Or has it arrived? Our iPads and smart phones, Bluetooths and medical scanners were all inspired by creative types behind Star Trek, like Wah Chang and Rick Sternbach. If society as a whole hasn’t changed, the technology that drives it certainly is making headway every day.

Here, September 8, 2016, fifty years after the airing of the first episode of Star Trek on NBC, the world is far different, yet it still continues the struggle for equality and fairness, the same desires Roddenberry’s original stories reflected as the world crept up to the cataclysmic summer of 1968. The same elements are summed up in the Vulcan acronym IDIC–infinite diversity in infinite combinations–the core of Vulcan philosophy celebrating all the differences in life. In short, that is what Star Trek is all about.

Next Thursday, September 8, 2016, Star Trek turns 50. As you gear up for your own Star Trek parties, you still have time to pick up what we think is one of the best anniversary releases this year–and it’s been a big marketing year for Star Trek. Classic Trivial Pursuit meets up with your favorite sci-fi franchise in Trivial Pursuit: The Star Trek 50th Anniversary Edition.

We’ve been playing this one over the course of the summer. CBS Studios, Paramount and Hasbro have done a fine job putting together a game that any Trek fan will enjoy. Housed in a model of everyone’s favorite shuttlecraft, you can leave this on the shelf and have a pick-up game anytime.

Trivial Pursuit is, of course, all about the questions and the questions in this edition are loyal to all Star Trek television series and movies–except the J.J. Abrams universe, the newly-designated “Kelvin timeline” films. For some reason the gamers chose to include questions from Star Trek’s original series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Star Trek Voyager, and Enterprise and the first ten Star Trek movies, but no alternate timeline questions. Perhaps they didn’t want to confuse players with possible contradictory answers from these separate story paths? No matter, if you like one flavor of Star Trek you probably like more than one series. Ultimately, the more players you have, the more you can spread out the knowledge and share in the fun.

That goes for players of all ages. Some questions are very easy, but others may trip up even the savviest Trek fan, especially if you’re not an expert in all of the Trek incarnations. Or if you don’t shout out the series or film the question is referencing, as designated on the edge of each card. The variety on each card is random enough that you might have an easy question followed by a tough question, as was common with the classic Trivial Pursuit game. Questions are both in-universe, like “What article of interstellar law were Kirk and McCoy arrested under by General Chang?” and real-world, like “Who was the only actor to be in both Star Trek pilot episodes?”

Last year CBS Consumer Products reached out to fifty artists of varying backgrounds and media across ten countries and commissioned works for an art exhibition commemorating the 50th anniversary of the original Star Trek series. The result was featured at Michael J. Wolf Fine Arts gallery in San Diego’s gaslight district during San Diego Comic-Con this year, followed by a stint in Las Vegas for the annual Star Trek convention. It then heads to the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto from mid-August to early September before heading to the England for the Destination Star Trek Europe convention in October and continuing its worldwide tour through August 2017.

Next week Titan Books is releasing an oversized coffee table edition to accompany the exhibition, featuring all fifty artists and their Star Trek contribution. Similar in design to the successful Star Trek: The Art of Juan Ortiz, reviewed here at borg.com, Star Trek: 50 Artists/50 Years, is a colorful, beautifully illustrated guide for the Star Trek fan that appreciates artists interpreting the franchise. The hardcover exhibition catalog showcases some artists known for their Star Trek work and others who have never dabbled in the Trek universe before. Media used in these interpretations include paper, sculpture, metal, ceramics, and textiles, some hand-created and others via computer. The book includes a foreword by Star Trek film director Nicholas Meyer, and interviews with the artists.

Paul Shipper’s “Star Trek Inception: The Cage”

Not surprisingly, the work of successful comic book cover artists Joe Corroney and J.K. Woodward is featured, Corroney with two vibrant retro style posters, and Woodward with a painting showing key Klingons throughout all the Star Trek series and films. A photograph incorporating the Vulcan salute by Leonard Nimoy was also included in the show. As with any non-juried exhibition, a few works don’t quite seem to stir the senses as the others, but those that do are of high-quality and well-conceived. Comic book artist and animator Dusty Abell’s poster thoughtfully includes an element of each of the 79 original episodes if the original series. It would be no surprise to find Viennese children’s illustrator Amir Abou-Roumié’s whimsical look at Star Trek characters in a future San Francisco, titled “Homestead,” at the Met. Disney, Hasbro, and DreamWorks freelance artist Sue Beatrice’s metal sculpture “On the Edge of Forever” is an exquisitely detailed timepiece featuring the starship Enterprise.

If you don’t already own Star Trek’s original series, animated series and movie series, a new boxed set coming next month may be the thing for you. As part of its 50th anniversary celebration of the original series, CBS and Paramount are partnering to release a high-end compilation of Blu-ray editions of some of the franchise’s best productions.

Every movie featuring the original Enterprise crew of William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, James Doohan, Nichelle Nichols, George Takei, and Walter Koenig, except Star Trek Generations–Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, and Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country–can be yours on Blu-ray. The original series is also included, and the director’s cut of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan released earlier this year.

For those who already have invested in the above content on Blu-ray, the additional material in the new boxed set that may draw you in is a first-time release of Star Trek: The Animated Series in high-definition on Blu-ray, as well as a multi-part documentary: Star Trek: The Journey to the Silver Screen—New 50th Anniversary. CBS/Paramount promises two hours of features with new content, covering The New Frontier: Resurrecting Star Trek, Maiden Voyage: Making Star Trek: The Motion Picture, The Genesis Effect: Engineering The Wrath of Khan, The Dream is Alive: The Continuing Mission, and End of an Era: Charting the Undiscovered Country.